Hindi was charged with murder, first-degree assault and seven counts of wanton endangerment, according to Louisville Metro Corrections, where he has been jailed. He will be arraigned on the charges Saturday morning.

Louisville police spokeswoman Alicia Smiley said Hindi was subdued by a retired Louisville police officer who was attending the meeting.

Merritt’s wife, Vivian, told the newspaper she and her husband lived in the Spring Creek neighborhood for 15 years. Her husband was a retired from the federal highway department and had served on the county planning commission, she said.

Records indicate Hindi graduated from medical school at the University of Jordan in 1982, the Courier-Journal reported.

Up to 20 people were in the church at the time of the 7:30 p.m. shooting, WAVE reported.

Neighbors said the shooting was the result of an argument over a concrete driveway that Hindi built on his property, WAVE reported.

The home's owner is listed as Musa Mahmoud Hindi, according to city documents.

Neighbor Myron Pass told WAVE that Hindi "has been here a couple of years and has done some things to his home that are not in the subdivision policies, and he was asked several times to remove the things that he had done and he refused."

A city land-use document says that after neighbors complained, officials determined a driveway in front of the home was put in without a permit and that it violated city code as it did not lead to a garage or carport or to the rear of the home. A fence was built too high and without the required setback in violation of city codes, too, the document said. The Spring Creek Homeowner’s Association contacted city staff and provided several records about the history the case, the document says.

This article includes reporting by NBC News' Jim Gold and The Associated Press.